A Qualitative Examination of the Impact of Racism on White Undergraduate Students
The purpose of the investigation was to further extend theory about White privilege and the costs of racism to Whites. The current investigation qualitatively analyzed interviews conducted with 10 White college students, at a large Midwestern university, focusing on: (a) perceived benefits of racism received by white individuals and (b) acknowledged or unacknowledged costs of racism experienced by white individuals. These data (i.e., interview transcripts) was analyzed using the Consensual Qualitative Research (CQR) method developed by Hill, Thompson, and Williams (1997). Within the data, seven different topic domains emerged-acknowledgement of White privilege, disadvantages of being White, affective reactions, impact of racism in social domain, self-appraisal, cognitive distortions, and conflict with religious beliefs due to racism. These topic domains were then analyzed for the frequency of occurrence among all interviews.
School:
Howard University
Department:
Psychology
Research Advisor:
Lisa Spanierman
Department of Research Advisor:
Educational Psychology
Year of Publication:
2003